Believe and achieve
Description
Academic Self-Esteem was examined as a moderator between two dimensions of positive and negative youth experiences (community experiences and perceptions of teacher beliefs) and academic achievement (grade point average and academic future expectations) in a sample of Black adolescents. Self-reported data were collected from 364 participants (grades 9-12, 70% girls) as part of the larger Teen Experiences Project. The students attended a high school in a large and urban city (Mean Age = 15.93, S.D = 1.56). Results from regression analyses revealed that academic self-esteem moderated relations between negative community experiences and academic achievement. For boys, academic achievement increased as academic self-esteem (ASE) and negative community experiences increased; but decreased when ASE was lower and negative community experiences were high. Exploratory regression analysis examining relations between grade level, ASE, and negative community experiences revealed that for students in older grades, achievement reduces when ASE is lower and negative community experiences are high. Implications and future directions for research are discussed.